Free McMansion by Justin Scott Page A

lay that parquet, expand that kitchen. They puffed up around the tool department. But the women were leading the way toward Bath and Kitchens and while they let the guys stop, briefly, like dogs at hydrants, they were unfolding sheets of paper with measurements written down.
    I was hunting a bankrupt contractor named Georgie Stefanopoulos, who used to specialize in decks, pool houses, and the surrounding landscape. We had played ball together when we were kids. By the time I returned to Newbury from my excursion into the wider world, Georgie owned a very large landscaping outfit. Last time I was here buying pressure-treated posts for Redman’s corral, I had spotted him wearing a name tag that said “George” and an orange apron that read, “I Can Help In Any Department.”
    I found him in Lumber, surrounded by flocks of customers, and trailed him as he answered questions on an orbit from Hardware to Plumbing to Electrical, outside to Gardening and back through Kitchen, Bath, Floors, Paint and Mill Work and back to Lumber, where I was finally able to make myself useful helping George help a carpenter on crutches who was buying three-quarter-inch birch-veneer plywood. We were breathing hard by the time we trundled the carpenter and his wood through checkout and loaded his pickup. I stood with George while he had a cigarette in the parking lot.
    He hadn’t put on a pound since high school, still a tightly wound little guy, with arms and legs as taut and strong as aircraft cable, the woven stainless steel wire rope that will not stretch.
    â€œHow you doing with the probation?” I asked. Management was on his case, he had told me last time, for flaring up at a customer who had annoyed him.
    â€œWhere’d you hear about that?”
    â€œYou mentioned it last time I saw you.”
    â€œI did?” He laughed, dryly. “I was spilling my guts, like the rage counselor said to. Yeah, it’s okay, now. I’m off.”
    â€œCongratulations.”
    â€œFreakin’ stupid thing to be congratulated for. Freakin’ idiot customer endangers his life and everyone in the aisle by climbing a wood rack and I’m the one who gets in trouble. They had a guy killed in the wood rack couple of years ago. It’s like a factory floor in there but people treat it like they’re buying cotton balls in the drug store. I had no idea how stupid people were ’til I got into retail.”
    â€œI’ll bet you miss construction,” I said, unsubtly. He looked mad as hell and that’s exactly the frame of mind I wanted him to discuss his nemesis Billy Tiller.
    He said, “I miss the money. I miss being my own boss. I miss my garage full of machines. I don’t miss the headaches.” Then he launched into more philosophy than he would have back then. “Freakin’ customers, come to you thinking they want a pool or a deck or a—a…”
    â€œPatio?”
    â€œDoesn’t matter if it’s a patio or pool or freakin’ pool house. They want the same thing. They want a dream realized.”
    This was a conversation that would have made more sense in a bar, on the third round. I blamed his sessions on channeling rage.
    â€œBut since they are incapable of expressing their dream in any concrete manner, they expect you the contractor to express it for them so that the job looks exactly like what they dreamed—note I say dreamed, not imagined, as they don’t have any freakin’ imagination to speak of, only a checkbook and a desire to own something perfect they can show off to their freakin’ friends.”
    â€œI wanted to ask you about Billy Tiller.”
    â€œBilly? That scumbag. Funny coincidence.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œWe’re talking about dreaming, here, right? That’s what Billy sold. From the get go. From the time he got out of high school.”
    â€œI don’t follow you.”
    â€œBilly was a